Final Answer: Allen Iverson officially retires from NBA

Former Philadelphia 76ers basketball player Allen Iverson speaks during a news conference Wednesday, Oct. 30, 2013, in Philadelphia. Iverson officially retired from thne NBA, ending a 15-year career during which he won the 2001 MVP award and four scoring titles. Iverson retired in Philadelphia where he had his greatest successes and led the franchise to the 2001 NBA finals. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

PHILADELPHIA — The man everyone came to see arrived late. Waiting for him to show, however, was their furthest thought when Allen Iverson finally popped his head out from one of Wells Fargo Center’s tunnels and assumed a seat behind a microphone.

In that moment, like so many others from his decorated career in that arena, Iverson was met with applause.

It’s been a while since Iverson last played a game in the NBA, so his retirement from the game seemed like nothing but a formality. Wednesday, the 76ers great called it a career.

Iverson’s last appearance was a game at Chicago Feb. 20, 2010, when he scored 13 points in 29 minutes. Since then, Iverson had attempted to extend his career in Turkey, and also suited up for an exhibition in China. The 38-year-old said he has not been staying in shape, nor has he been waiting by a telephone.

“I gave everything to basketball,” Iverson said, getting teary-eyed. “The passion is still there. The desire to play is just not. I just feel good that I’m happy with the decision that I’m making. It was a great ride.”

Iverson’s legacy on the court is well documented. Generously listed at 6-foot, 165 pounds — “soaking wet,” he said with a chuckle — Iverson earned a league MVP award in 2001, the same season in which he guided the Sixers to the NBA Finals, as well as 11 All-Star Game appearances and four scoring titles.

That legacy, for better or worse, also includes what Iverson did off the floor — including his public image.

“I wouldn’t change anything,” Iverson said. “My career was up and down at times. I made a lot of mistakes, a lot of things I’m not proud of. But it’s only for other people to learn from.

“I took an (rear)-kicking for me being me in my career, me looking the way I look and dressing the way I dress. My whole thing was being me and now you look around and you see all of the guys in the NBA, all of them have tattoos and all of them are wearing cornrows. It used to be the suspect was the guy with cornrows. Now you see the police officer with the cornrows. I took a beating for those type of things and I’m proud to be able to say I changed a lot in this culture and in this game. It’s not about how you look. It’s who you are on the inside.”

For his announcement, Iverson came back to the city where his career took off – “where I became a household name,” he said. And while here, he doled out countless thank-yous.

He thanked John Thompson, his coach at Georgetown University, who was in attendance. He praised Larry Brown, his coach for six seasons with the Sixers, who thinks so highly of “the kid” that he has since asked Iverson to address his players at Southern Methodist University. He acknowledged Aaron McKie, his teammate for eight seasons, who kept Iverson “from making two million mistakes.” He admired former Sixers owner Pat Croce, too.

It’s been more than three seasons since Iverson last wore a Sixers jersey. The franchise has changed owners once and coaches three times in that span. For current Sixers owner Josh Harris, Iverson’s impact on the team is not lost on him.

“This is his house and he’s always welcome here, forever,” Harris said.

Iverson played recklessly, tumbling to the hardwood multiple times nightly to make a play. His body took a beating. So did his public image. The Newport News, Va., native said he’d heard all his life that “nothing comes out” of his hometown. He set out to prove doubters wrong, Iverson said.

That meant being himself, at the risk of public clamoring.

“A negative story about Allen Iverson is going to sell regardless,” Iverson said. “Don’t nobody want to talk about what I do for the Boys & Girls Club. Don’t nobody want to talk about how many turkeys I give out for Thanksgiving. Don’t nobody want to talk about the things I do for homeless people. A negative Allen Iverson story, it’s like, ‘Let me open up this newspaper and see what this is all about.’

Iverson spent parts of 12 of his 14 NBA seasons with the Sixers, scoring a bulk of his 24,368 points, 19th-most in NBA history, with the team that drafted him No. 1 overall in 1996.

“I’m always going to be a Sixer until I die,” Iverson said. “When you think of Philadelphia basketball, you think of Allen Iverson. I earned that.”

All of those games and all of those roadtrips took Iverson away from his five children for too many years, which is why Iverson said he plans to spend most of his time in retirement being “the father I wanted to be.” Three of his children accompanied him to Philadelphia for his press conference.

“I cheated my kids out of a lot as far as being a father — not being malicious or anything like that, or not being willing to do it or not wanted to do it,” Iverson said. “I didn’t have the time to be the father I wanted to be, or should’ve been. And all I thought about in retirement was I can be a 24/7 dad. That made it so much easier to say I’m hanging them up. I can be there for my kids.”

Beyond that, Iverson’s post-basketball life is loaded with uncertainty.

Iverson said he doesn’t want basketball to define him, though it’s likely he’ll be back in town – perhaps as soon as a later date this season — when the Sixers eventually hoist a banner bearing his number into the rafters.

In the time since he last played, Iverson said he’s encountered plenty of aspiring basketball players who wish to follow in Iverson’s footsteps. What he tells them demonstrates that Iverson was true to himself, even into the final moments of his basketball career.

“Anybody that wants to be me,” he said, “I would tell them not to be like me, but to want to be better than me.”